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Wilderness Survival

Fire - From Two Stones

Marcasite and Flint

 
Materials in the photos on this page provided by Rob Bicevskis. Photos by Walter Muma.

This is a piece of marcasite.

  

This photo shows the materials you need to start a fire from marcasite.

First, you need a hunk of marcasite, of course. This mineral is shown at the bottom left of this photo.

To get sparks from the marcasite, you also need a piece of flint - bottom right.

To catch the spark, you can use a variety of materials. Here a piece of False Tinder Fungus "cloth" is shown, at the top of the photo.

  

Here is a movie that shows striking the sparks onto the False Tinder Fungus "cloth". The False Tinder Fungus catches the sparks and starts glowing. From there you can place the Tinder Fungus up against a tinder bundles and blow the whole thing into flame.

Note that you need to strike the marcasite repeatedly, perhaps about 20 times.

Click on the small photo to view the movie
Windows Media format (WMV)
320x240, 466 KB
  

The False Tinder Fungus has caught a spark from the two stones and is smoldering - this is visible in the upper left corner of the Tinder Fungus. You can see the glow around the edge of the circular black area.

  
Some Notes...

One doesn't necessarily need flint - almost any "tough" rock will do - like quartz.

Marcasite against marcasite also works.

Some people have also had success with other iron sulfides (ie, iron pyrite).

 

Survival      Fire       Flint & Steel      Two Stones

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